Once Upon a Time First Look: Storybrooke Drama for Belle and Ariel, Neal/Emma/Hook and More

This Sunday, ABC’s Once Upon a Time travels back to Storybrooke, where things aren’t quiet as one might think.

As previously reported, the show will rewind a bit to when Rumple, Emma et al first set sail for Neverland, leaving Belle in charge of protecting the sleepy Maine burg. Ariel will eventually surface in Storybrooke, sent by Rumple and Regina to help Belle locate an artifact the Dark One can use to trump Pan.

But it appears that just as Beauty makes friends with The Little Mermaid, two men — ID’d in captions simply as “keychain” and “glasses,” and played by James Immekus and Matt Kane — stir up trouble, lashing the lasses together. A possible clue to their identities: Freya Tingley, who last season guest-starred as Wendy Darling, also appears in the episode.

Meanwhile in Neverland: Emma, Neal and Hook try to ignore the tremendous amounts of awkward as they journey to Dark Hollow to find and hopefully capture Peter Pan’s shadow.

I think that they’ll be John and Michael, Wendy’s brothers… Like they became Lost Boys and are now working for Pan. Wendy will appear since she is trapped in Neverland, in the other hanging cage that Baelfire was not in.

Good to see that Belle is only there to be a plot device and a victim. Wouldn’t want to branch out with her character or anything.
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All the other promos look too much like every other episode to get worked up about, but I assume now that they have super magical Neal who totally escaped Neverland and wasn’t all let off so that he could impregnate teenage Emma and create Henry, Tink will help them. How come nobody has called shenanigans on Neal’s ‘escape’?

Sorry, Matt. I’m at work. Just confused about how they’ve actually had Hook say nobody but Neal has ever escaped Neverland with Pan’s say so without anyone making the connection that perhaps Pan’s centuries long obsession with Henry might somehow connected. Unless they’re saving it as a ~twist or something.

They did address that issue already. Bae confronted Pan & Pan told him he can’t leave Neverland w/o his permission to which Bae replied he did before and Pan basically challenged that theory & said something like did u really leave. no one leaves i dont want to, and yet your here, it’s as if u never left. So Neal not necessarily escaping Nwverland on his own has been addressed.

Every time someone drinks whiskey on OUAT, it’s Widmore’s whiskey. Just like every time someone eats chocolate, it’s an Apollo bar. It’s not the first and probably not the last time we see one of these items. It’s a nice wink to Lost fans and I like it, but it’s not surprising anymore, we’re used to it. I’d be surprised if they suddenly started showing different brands :)

Unfortunately for the OUAT, Matt’s captions are better than the actual show – so really now, Pan somehow found out about the Regina & Gold’s plan, and sent his henchmen to thwart it? ……..I can’t believe Gold, Regina, and Emma haven’t just teamed up and out magicked Pan – wouldn’t that have been the first thing to try?

Great Captions, pure delight. Better writers than OUAT writers. They really believe we are stupid?
Dragging this season, we need more Dark One Time and less Charmings. Do we really care about Swan Theif or Captain Swan? Save Henry and go home. Leave the Charmings there. MM can be the lost boys mother. Have a great weekend one and all